The developnt level 13 was far away, and the system had told that I would only get the new lifespan gene at level 15. Even though I had literal years of life until then, the increasing gap still made worry a little.
But with our most direct competitor removed from the playing board, the Bee Empire advanced with a sure stride of the iron feet of its chas.
It took several weeks to fully adjust to my new ability to ditate instead of sleeping, but when I did, it was truly incredible. This state didn’t just increase my intelligence—it turned on so parts of my brain that must’ve been only active during sleep.
When I ditated, my mind always blood with incredibly creative ideas, the type that usually only ca to a person in dreams, only to be forgotten in the morning. Not all of them were good, but they helped solve a lot of problems as the Bee Empire continued growing.
Although the direct need for ground-penetrating radars had disappeared, Researchina continued to develop the radar technology alongside other radar technologies.
I also told her to research how to record sound and other information on sothing more advanced than punch cards.
The Hardbees with the ’Fast Learner X I’ gene not only breezed through all their education programs, but also made great Researchers. Their heat immunity allowed them to perform even dangerous experints without fearing for their lives. And, of course, they worked very hard.
When Researchina got the first generations of upgraded Hardbees as her new Researchers, they ca up with a way to make sound records in no ti! Our other research got a boost, too—but then, everything did!
With ti, even so humans learned how to make the most basic radio receivers, and the bees (using chas, of course) built powerful transmitting towers to reach all the largest human cities in the Empire.
Artist Bees who learned human languages read holy books and made theatre plays that subtly or not-so-subtly propagated the idea of bee superiority and divinity.
The sound coming from boxes, by itself, was a miracle to humans—and they treated radios with appropriate reverence. I only encouraged that—I didn’t want humans to get too much knowledge about technology and start getting silly ideas like "overthrowing bees"... No, that’d be terrible, and all too likely with how history always went with conquerors.
Instead, I instructed my girls to only teach advanced technologies to select humans and propagate the idea that any knowledge of these technologies was sacred. Only blessed hands could touch it without sullying!
The human artisans who got to make radios weren’t told HOW they worked, either—only what to do to make them work and catch the only radio station that had programs for humans. To them, it was a complex magic ritual.
Sotis, I felt that I created sothing very silly... But it was all for a good cause!
Artist Bees also made two radio stations for bees. One was only for news about various things that happened across the Empire; I or Amby would also co here once a month and say sothing nice to our girls.
The second radio station was for entertainnt and transmitted theatre plays, book readings and such. It was my favourite—I liked to turn it on for our dinners together with Amby. By schedule, this was always the ti of joke readings...
"Could a Hunter Bee bring any nectar to the hive? Of course, she just has to rob a bumblebee for it!"
Sotis I even laughed. Not on this one, though.
After the invention of sound recordings, fewer Artist Bees had to work as speakers, and they had more ti to gather new materials for shows and news programs.
But the more radio advanced, the sharper beca the cable crisis. The lack of rubber and oil was forcing us to use more expensive and less convenient materials for many details in the Bee Empire’s chanisms, and this was stopping our growth.
Our Researchers had designed chemical batteries that generated a bit of energy by themselves—enough to fuel radio receivers for a while—but each radio tower and each radar placed at our borders needed its own coal generator.
Until so scouts, whose astral projections have been scouring the continent for natural resources all this ti, have reported that they have found it!
The precious black gold—natural oil!
The reserves of it were only discovered thanks to the astral projections flying through the ground itself. They didn’t seep to the surface here, to my disappointnt.
These oil reservoirs were deep underground, and the scouts only found them because they were searching for new tal veins to mine.
But thanks to the Empire’s chas, the designs of which improved with each iteration of the models, we could dig this deep. I imdiately gave orders to build oil wells and begin extracting it by the good old thod of pumping water underground.
Although the pumps required fuel to work, the oil was much more precious than so coal!
As soon as we got so, excited Researchina personally led the experints to turn it into benzine and various polyrs, both of which were incredibly useful in industry.
I had to remind Researchina that she was the Science Adviser of the entire Empire and should delegate things like actual research to other people.
"You can still poke at these chemical things you like so much in your free ti, my dear!" I cald her after she almost pouted at this order. "But you spent entire days in the lab."
In a few months, Malevolence proudly finished conquering the forr Hatha territories from the countless hostile insects and beasts living there, and the Bee Empire looked toward the rest of the continent.
But at the sa ti, the Agents who had bravely risked travelling on a ship over the entire ocean were doing dangerous and important work on another continent... In the Vardish Empire, which gave so many headaches in the past.
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